Adatis BI Blogs

Whilst I wasn’t fortunate enough to attend the Microsoft Data Summit on June 12-13 2017, I managed to view the keynote through a live webinar. The majority of this session contained details of what is coming soon in Power BI, more than likely over the next few months. We all know the ‘roadmap’ can be as long as a piece of string, but I am hopeful the features mentioned in this blog will all be available by the end of the calendar year. Without further ado, I will move onto the features. Out Now The below features were actually released in the June Power BI Desktop Download. ü Data bars for new table & matrix (preview) o This is the concept of having spark lines within a table or matrix, providing trend analysis in a visual way. ü Fonts in Visuals o You can now alter the font in a visual, the same as the functionality within a text box property. These small configurations actually make a big difference. Coming Soon ü New SKUs for power bi premium specifically targeting embedded workloads... EM1 and EM2 SKUs starting at $625 per month. The difference pricing tiers are: ü Embed using new SKU’s into SharePoint and MS Teams easily o I wander if the code will be completely free? ü New Visio diagram control – auto mapping to data model entities. Copy and paste a Visio diagram into power BI and it hooks up the data elements. o This looked really slick in the Microsoft demo but previous experiences with this functionality un SharePoint was a little clunky and fiddly. ü Embed a Power APP into Power BI – with write back functionality o This could replace MDS for certain scenarios, depending on the how complex your reference/master data is. ü New Quick Measure gallery – a new DAX measure, upload it to the gallery and have your name referenced in the Product. o Chris Webb recently had this privilege, with a link to his blog series here. ü Better Custom Visual support. o New button to install custom visuals from store without having to download and import first. ü Ability to remove stop words in the Word Cloud Custom Visual ü Drill through to other report tabs using Page Settings. o This is huge for Power BI. Something seemingly so simple is not available but I for one am very excited for when this feature is released. ü Bookmark pane to facilitate a ‘save state’ (all current filter settings). In addition, it will support analysts who want to tell a story or provide a walkthrough. o Show/hide visuals on a page when building story ü Create buttons o Turn a button into a report page link o Use buttons to show/hide visuals o Again, a simple, but MASSIVE feature for Power BI. This really helps with the user’s reporting journey. ü Quick insights type functionality built into visuals and desktop to answer “why” questions - using AI ü Waterfall chart improvements ü Cortana Improvements o More integration o Using colleague names in Cortana to find PBI workbooks o Conversational Q&A – refine answer with further questions ü What-If Analysis o Like Excel ü Annotation support for presenting back to customers. o In effect, you can doodle or draw on top of a Power BI report. Further Reading I would advise subscribing to the Power BI Blog, in which you will hear of any new announcements to features, etc. In addition, there are some other great pages out there too: o Power BI Blog - http://bit.ly/2rkLGoq o Power BI Premium Capacity White Paper - https://aka.ms/pbiewhitepaper o Chris Webb Blog Page – https://blog.crossjoin.co.uk/ Contact Me If you have any questions or thoughts, please leave a comment below. My Twitter details are also provided. Twitter: @CallumGAdatis